It is a time for reflection and remembrance.  

At headquarters, we gather as we do every year in the 'Garden of Remembrance' to light a candle and share a moment of silent reflection or prayer.

Many delegations have their own ritual to honor the memory of our deceased.
May the memory of our dear colleagues be present in our hearts!

Caroline Welch-Ballentine

Director of Human Resources

Yves Daccord

General Manager

Remembrance

Geneva International Conference Centre. Memorial ceremony to Nadisha Yasassri Ranmuthu, killed on July 22nd 2003 in Iraq.

Baghdad, ICRC delegation. Mourning following the killing of Nadisha Ranmuthu on Hilla-Baghdad road.

Geneva International Conference Centre. Memorial ceremony for Ricardo Munguía killed on 27 March 2003 in Afghanistan.

Extract from the speech by Cornelio Sommaruga, president of the ICRC, at the inauguration of the Garden on 8 May 1998.

When we at the ICRC decided to create this place of remembrance, we had just said goodbye to the year 1996, a year which will forever be marked with a black stone in the history of the Red Cross, a year whose painful memory will remain closely linked to the fatal names of Mugina and Novye Atagy.

The shock, the emotion and the deep sadness that these two tragedies provoked in us, when the very foundation of our mission was attacked, were undoubtedly the trigger that allowed an idea to take shape, that of honoring the memory of all those who lost their lives in the exercise of their humanitarian commitment. 

Geneva. Silent march in memory of the six delegates murdered in Novye Atagi in Chechnya